How To Deal With Roller Skating Foot Pain

Boot-related Foot Pain (Wrong Sizing)

The most important thing you have to know is that the shoes you wear every day are far different from skating boots especially in terms of the size. Many people have a habit of buying shoes that are a bit tight or slightly wide to wear and they do the same with roller skates, which is completely wrong.

Since rollerblading is a sport that requires primarily movements in feet and legs, choosing suitable boots is of great necessity. When skating, you have to stop and turn at high speed or even suddenly which requires the harmonious combination of both feet and ankles.

Moreover, when you are at a higher level, you want to perform many tricks and it will create pressure on your feet. Thus, if you wear inappropriate shoes, you will get foot pain.

Small Shoes

Many people tend to wear tighter shoes than usual to have responsive actions and better control. But wearing boots that are too small means you are throwing yourself into hot water.

First of all, you may feel uncomfortable and under pressure, then your feet will be anesthetic, bruised and sore. More seriously, if this situation persists, it will lead to many negative effects on other parts of the foot such as heel, ankles, knees and spine joints.

Large Shoes

How about too large boots? Do you think that loose shoes will help you feel comfortable or move easily? Yes, that’s true, but not in all cases. There is a story that there was a guy who was skating on a rail, unfortunately, he fell and his boots flew off and hit him on the head. It sounds funny but this situation can also cause foot pain.

Getting into too big shoes means you have to face the difficulty in moving your feet and legs, as a result, your boots may slip during the process of playing these sports.

In addition, you may suffer from dislocated ankles when doing the flip tricks because the feet are not firmly fixed in the shoes. One of the functions of boots is protecting feet but it cannot do that when you wear too-large shoes.

Lace bite

Lace bite or skate bite is common foot pain in sports that require footwear, especially roller skating. To put it simply, it is a pain that runs the front of your ankles down to your toes.

When you have a lace bite, your feet will have symptoms like redness, hurt when touching or swelling so that you are unable to move normally.

There are many reasons that lead to lace bite but the most common cause stems from the fact that your feet and ankles are suffering a great magnetic force from the rollers under the boot.

This stress may result from overtraining, tying too tightly, wearing shoddy shoes, using new boots and so on. Although lace bite seems simple, some professional athletes are still struggling to deal with such foot pain.

Stress fractures

Occasionally, you may experience minor pain for a short time and do not consider it a serious problem, however, they may be the symptom of stress fractures.

This roller skating foot pain is a collection of tiny cracks that most are in the second and third metatarsals where bones are quite thin and long. Moreover, it also occurs in different positions such as heel or ankle when transferring the overburden of pressure to bones of the foot.

Stress fractures usually exist when we take off and land from jumps wrongly. It will be difficult to identify early because, after many small cracks, we will feel the pain clearly. This injury may get worse if we ignore it and continue to practice. And in some cases, stress fractures can develop into a full-blown fracture.

Other Injuries

Besides roller skating foot pain mentioned above, you may also get other injuries affecting your health. Skaters, especially athletes, spend lots of time on training to form a suitable compressive and shear stress between malleolus and shoes. Therefore, the bones in the ankle will swell and hurt, causing malleolar bursitis. It’s quite common but not as dangerous as other foot pain

Another injury is plantar fasciitis that creates the pain in the bottoms of the feet. It often occurs at the first few steps in the morning, then decreases. However, it may exist again when we stand up after sitting. Like stress fractures, plantar fasciitis could be worse if we practiced a lot.

Prevention

Firstly, we have to prepare the appropriate equipment, especially skating boots. You should choose a pair of shoes that fit your feet, not too large or too small. Next, the boots you buy should be in medium quality or higher, don’t use the old or low-quality skates.

Secondly, warm-up carefully before skating. It is necessary to make sure that your feet and muscles are stretched to minimize the injuries and ready to have an interesting experience with roller skating. You should use proper technique to improve your endurance and prevent foot injuries.

Choosing a suitable surface for skating is also important to limit the pain. You should avoid streets, sidewalks or any places that have potential danger. Don’t try to skate in rough or too smooth surfaces because you will easily fall down and it can be very painful.

Finally, you should start slowly to familiarize yourself with the ground conditions and equipment, and then, you can skate comfortably.

Self-treatment

In some simple cases, we can treat roller skating foot pain ourselves. For example, when you have a lace bite, you can buy protective wear like lace hooks or, a soft pad for the top of the foot to add inside skates. In this way, the pressure on your feet will be reduced and spread evenly which helps us avoid injuries.

When you have pain, reduce or stop sliding, then gently take off the boots and check your injuries. If it’s swollen or bruised, apply ice around the sore for about 20 minutes to relieve pain quickly. After that, you should see a doctor for treatment.

And the last self-treatment we want to introduce is rest – the most important cure for roller skating foot pain. You should have a rest from skating and other physical activities related to the pain in a few weeks, it will give you a chance to recover faster. This treatment is so easy, right?

Get Medical Attention

As good health is very essential for any sports, you need to have medical examinations regularly. As mentioned above, stress fracture doesn’t have clear symptoms and if we are subjective, we will only realize when it gets worse.

Getting medical attention helps you stay healthy and prevent serious pain, and thus, if you have any pre-existing problems, go to a hospital or reputable clinic to see your troubles and make sure that it’s still under control.